Oscillation generator



Filed Dec. 29. 1948 .AMEAcf/AM A T TOR/VE Y t@ y'tor-nl ay bepoint contactelectrodes making rec- Patentecl june 12, 1.951

OSCILLATION GENERATOR Lamed-A. Meacham, New Providence, N. J., assignor to Bell Telephone Laboratories, {Incorporated,.New York, N. Y., a corporation .of New York .FICE

maar

Applicationl December 29, 1,948, Serial No. 67,920

(Cl. v250-36) l Claims. 1 .This invention relates to the generation of oscillations with'the aid of semiconductor -amplifiers and to novel self-oscillation .circuits therefor.

The principal object of' the invention'is to draw a maximum amount oipower from alsemiconductor oscillator and supply vit to a load, consistent with the maintenance of selfosci1lation at a desired power level.

The invention utilizes as its central element a three-electrode semiconductor amplier of the type whichforms .a part of the subject-matter of United .States Patent 2,524,035, which issued on October 3, 1950, on an application of John Bardeen and Walter H. Brattain, Serial No. 33,466, lfiled June 17, 1948. IThis application is a ycontinuation-impart of an earlier application of the .same inventors, Serial No. 11,165, filed February 26, 19,48, and, after the iiling of the later application, Y.allowed to become abandoned. This central element comprises a small block of semi-conductor material such as germanium having, in its original-form, at least three .electrodes .electrically coupled thereto, whichare termed-the emitter, the' collector, and .ibase electrode. yThe emitter andthe collectifiervcontact with the block, while the base electrode may be a plated metal film providing a low resistance contact. ,The emitter may be biased for conduction in .the vfor-ward direction while the collector is biased for conduction in the reverse direction. The application of a signal to the emitter produces a signal frequency current in the collector and in an external circuit connected thereto which..may include a load. By reason of certain'phenomena which take place within the block, amplii'ledversions of the voltage, current and .power of the original signal appear in the load.

The device, which may take various forms, has received the.appellationTransistor and will be so designated in the .present-specication.

It is pointed out inthe .aforementioned Bardeen-Brattain applications that, by feeding back a yportion of theoutputl-voltage. improper phase to the input terminals, the device may be caused to oscillate. at. a `frequency .determined by 'its` external circuit elements, and those applications disclose a self-oscillation circuit in which the collector, as output terminal, is coupled back to the lemitter as input terminal for the maintenance ofsuch oscillations. Following the example offfco,mgentionalvacuum tubecircuitry, the load is placed in circuit with the outputelectrode, namely, the collector.

The characteristics or' the transistor, however, diier widely from those of the more conventional Vacuum tube. Chief among these differences is that' the impedance of the emitter is much lower than' the impedance of the collector. Specically, the emitter'impedance in typical cases is ofthe order of 500Lohms while the collector impedance is, of the 'order of 20,000 to '56,000 ohms. Therefore the emitter draws a substantial signal frequencyfcurrent, as compared with the grid 'of 'a vacuum tube triode which'dra'ws substantially no current at all.

The present invention acknowledges these and other characteristic differences .between the transistor andthe conventional Vacuum tube, and furnishes principles of design which take full advantage of them. In particular, it is recognized that, in the transistor oscillator, the collector is the power source while the emitter, the tuning elements, and the load are all power sinks and that, therefore, no one of 4these three circuits can safely be matched to the other taken by itself, but rather the collector, as power source, should be matched inimpeclance to the load, the tuning elements and the emitter taken together; and that, .furthermore the optimum arrangement is not merely one in which the load, thetuning. elements and the emitter taken together receivea maximum amount of power from'the collector, but that afurther requirement exists for optimum operation; namely, that the power be divided between the load and'tu'ning elements on the one hand, and the emitter on the other in such away that the emitter receives only enough of the collector .power to maintain self-oscillation while the load and tuning elements receive the balance.

.The inventionprovides specic circuit arrangements .in which.- these general principles are. embodiedandimplemented, and formulae are developed which enable the designer'to arriveat optimum v alues of the circuit parametersA directlyand easily.

It isa feature of the invention that a low irnpedanceload'is .preferably yconnected with the emitter of the .transistor rather than with the collector, whichwould be the case if the analogy with the vacuum .tube oscillator art were followe'd.

It is a further feature that the load may, in general, be connected either in :parallel with vthe emitter or in series with it, although, depending upon circumstances, one of these connections may be preferable to the other.

The invention will be fully apprehended from thefollowing detailedl description of certain illusaes-aces trative embodiments, taken in connection with the appended drawings, in which:

Fig. l is a schematic circuit diagram of a transitor oscillator network, back-coupled and loaded in accordance with the invention;

Fig. 2 is an equivalent circuit diagram useful in explaining the operation of Fig. l;

Figs. 3, 4 and 5 are schematic diagrams of transistor oscillator networks which are alternative to the oscillator network of Fig. l.

Referring now to the drawings, there is shown in Fig. l a transistor comprising a block or wafer l of semi-conducting material such as germanium which has been suitably prepared, and having an emitter 2, a collector 3, and a base electrode In series between the base and the collector are connected a source of direct current such as a battery 5, and a parallel-tuned or antiresonant circuit comprising a coil 6 in parallel with a condenser 'l'. In series between the base and the emitter are connected a direct current source 8 and a load resistor RLl. A blocking condenser 9 is connected between a tap ll on the coil 4 and the emitter terminal 2 of the transistor. The polarities and voltages of the direct current sources 5 and are so chosen that the emitter operates in the forward or low-impedance direction while the collector operates in the reverse or high-impedance direction. In particular, for a transistor of N-type germanium, as explained in the Bardeen-Brattain patent applications to which reference has been made earlier, the emitter may have a mean potential of the order of +05 volt and the collector 40 volts, both being measured with respect to the base electrode.

For these bias conditions, the emitter of a typical transistor exhibits a low variational impedance, of the order of 300 ohms, while the collector has a relatively high variational impedance, of approximately 30,000 ohms. Furthermore, when a signal is impressed upon the emitter in addition to the bias, an amplified copy thereof is delivered to a suitable terminating impedance in the collector circuit. The power amplification thus obtained may be as great as 100 to l, or 20 decibels. Accordingly, in an ideal oscillator, only about l per cent of the power delivered from the collector would need to be fed back to energize the emitter, thus leaving 99 per cent available for supplying losses in the tuning elements, and for delivery as useful power to a load. The oscillator of the present invention approaches this ideal. It fails to reach it in practice only in so far as additional power may be devoted to the emitter, causing moderate overload and a corresponding reduction of gain in the transistor, for the sake of insuring continued oscillation in spite of possible changes of bias potentials, temperature, or other operating condition.

The operation of the oscillator may be fully understood by reference to Fig. 2 in which the transistor is represented in the form known as an equivalent four-pole" i2 having input terminals '2' and 6l and output terminals 3 and 4', where the leads 2', 3', 4 correspond to the transistor electrodes 2, 3, respectively. The general principles underlying the use of such an equivalent four-pole to represent a network containing an amplier or other active element are explained in an article by L. C. Peterson entitled Equivalent Circuits of Linear` Active Four-Terminal Networks published in volume 27 of the Bell System Technical Journal for October 1948, Page 593.*- -Its application to networks including transistors is discussed in an application of H. L. Barney, Serial No. 58,684, led November 6, 1948. The variational or alternating-current characteristics of the transistor are `fully represented by the elements shown in the iigure, namely, a self-impedance Zn and a transfer impedance Zn in the internal emitter-tc-base path, and by a self-impedance Z22 and a transfer impedance Zai in the internal collector-to-base path. For any frequency in the range from zero to approximately one megacycle, these impedances are essentially non-reactive. Accordingly they are assumed herein to be pure resistances. The two transfer impedances may conveniently be thought of as generators, as drawn in Fig. 2, each producing a potential proportional to the current in the opposite branch of the equivalent circuit. That is, the passage of a current ic inward to the collector causes a potential o equal to Zizic in the emitter-to-base path, so poled as to maire the emitter terminal more positive. Similarly, the passage of current ie inward to the collector produces a potential v equal to Zzie in the collectorto-base path so poled as to make the collector more positive. The magnitudes of these four impedances in a typical case may be:

Z1i=400 ohms Z12=l00 ohms Zz2=30,000 ohms Z21=50,000 ohms Assume now that the emitter current ie has a suitable operating value, which as has been seen may moderately overload or exceed the linear range of the transistor, and for this value let the quantities Zn, Ziz, Z22 and Zn be determined in accordance with the principles or" the invention. The collector current is then:

the variational component vc of the collector potential is and the total power from the collector is Zmzi 4Z22 Now in order -to produce the assumed current ie, a voltage ce must be applied to the emitter. From the figure, its magnitude is Accordingly, an amount of power equal to must be supplied to the emitter and may be taken from the power PC available at the collector. To symbolize the method of the invention for accomplishing this, an ideal transformer I3 is shown coupling the collector circuit with-'the e Yemitter circuit. It has ajratio of Eprimary turns N1 V'to 'secondary turns N2 which yis preferably equalto rz-: Z21Z22 N2 11e 2Z11Z22-*Z12Z21 INow-the `total power --Pc delivered by -the'col `lector -fmfust -be equal, in the .absence :of other power sources, to the sumrofrthe powers Pe, Pr an'dLPLlabsorbedfby the emitter, thetuningele merits-L, r, Gandlthe-load,:respectively. Thus .'PcInPe-I-VPT-i-APL But, if oscillations are -to be maintained at the assumed power level, Peis a fixed quantity, so that the power available for apportionment betweenthe tuning elements and -theload is The-'apportionment oi .this-poweras between c the .tuning elements v.and lthe load is at .thedis- 'posall of .the designer, hand must l,ingeneralrepresent a compromise between.conilicting.considera tions of maximum output poweron theone hand and '.frequency..rstabilityzand ,purity .of wave form 'on'the other. Thus,v if optmumipurityof wave -formisi required, the `tuning -elements must `v,absorb .thesfgreateripart of the'xavailablepower, and Pr .is-larger Ithan PL. yIf,on ,thetotherhand -wave form purityand stability are' notcontrolling considerations while allppossible power output -is 5desired, then PL is largerthan PT. vA fair-compromise, suitable for concltionslikelyto beencountered in practice, is to apportion the vavailable ypower equally betweenthe tuning elements and the load, thus making where Rr land RL :are lthel effective resistances of the tuning elements and of Ithe external load,

. respectively,

vlrom thisit follows that L ial;

RTI'TTPFP.

vand

i 21/2 RWA-R,

Byme'ans'f 'the preceding equations; allof the parametersvefve, Pe and "Pe may be `expressed in terms of ie and the four internal impedances of: t'h'e *transistorwhichapply (in view of overload) "forthe' chosen value of ie. Ifthe-values of By comparing' the values, 'in 'this tabulation, of Pc, Pe, PT and PL, it may be noted that the sum of the last two is equal to the diierence of the first 6 two; li. e., f that1-after f-ur-*r-iishing the --emitter with the power required to maintain the desiredlfcondition of self-oscillation, all of the remainder is economically utilized in'the tuning elements and the external load; and that the two last-named lpower sinks absorb -equal'amounts of power, )in accordance with'the compromise adopted.

If, in the Wforegoing examplealargervaIueof variational emitter 'current ic had been taken, such` as 2 vmilliamperes 'different effectiveivalues Aof Zu, Zn, 'Z22 and Zm'wouldhave resultedfrom non-linearity of the transistor;sothat'neitherie nor of wouldfincreasein'direct-proportion. Some increase =in these quantities would, however, result. In particular, 'it may be seen that when the'peak amplitude or the alternating'component (te) "ofthe collector potentialv is so increasedthat it't'reaches'thevalue ofV the steady bias component thereof, "the collector no longer operates vinthe reverse `direction, 'but 'rapidly acquiresv alow impedance, associated'with forward operation. Thisrapi'd 'change of collector impedance-"causes harmonic 'distortion of the oscillator output, which may be undesirablefbut on the'other hand it '.providesal limiting action whichten'dsto regulate the 'amplitude of vc at `a valuer approximately equal to the collector bias. In Vsome applications 'the latter property vmaybe 'utilized to advantage., since in the circuit of Fig."2"it also stabilizes, the amplitude of the 'voltage V@Macross the'road RL.

"Returning 'now to Fig. l, "it"'may be seenl that it can be derived'from `Fig.2 merely byreplacing the ideal transformer. I3 by a, tap I0 on `the;tun ing inductance "6 .at va point Naturnsfro'm the lower terminal of the 'winding '(thetotal number of "turns 4Vbeing N1), and adding the 'blocking vcondenser S'anddirect current, sou`rcesj5,r 8.` 'Ifhe low-impedance load RL1 'corresponds lto Rrjof Fig. 2. vOnthe other hand,`if preferred, a load 'RLZ of high impedance may be connected across a fraction or "all of the inductance'5,as by .way of the tap Iljthe tap'being so locatedias ,toQ'd'eliver the allotted powerto the load. 'Whenthis is done, a moderately flarge resistance 'or'l .'.in

"'ductanceis used inmplace of the load for`RL1,"this element then drawing `little For 'no power l'fro'm the oscillator, but providing 'a vpath for direct current to the emitter.

Fgf3 shows another/embodiment, inwhlch the impedancetransformation symbolized by the ideal transformer I3 of'Fig. f2 obtained by 'means of a coil I5 antiresona'nt with'two con- 'densers C1 and C2 uin series, the 'emitter' 2 r being connected to their'common terminal. Here the operatiorilis essentially the same as in Fig. 2, the function'ofthe ideal 'transformer I3 beinglper-- formed; bythetwo condensers in accord with^well= To securetlie same ,trans-i formation ratio 'requires that l 1 Tita-agp 1 wN1. .wCg

,Q NL 1 C11-N2 In Fig. 4, another embodiment of the invention isshown, wherein a secondary .winding 2D, closely Acoupled toa primary Icoil 2l tuned by a condenser 22, is used to supply power at low impedance to the emitter 2 and to the load RL. In

assesses this case the turns ratio of primary to secondary is as inthe ideal transformer I3 of Fig. 2. One advantage of this arrangement over those of Fig. 1 and Fig. 3 is that a direct-current path to the emitter is afforded by way or the secondary winding 29 and hence that the load RL is not required to carry the steady component of the emitter current,

On the other hand, this arrangement establishes a path from the source 5 to the emitter 2 which includes only the impedance of the secondary winding 26. At very low frequencies and, in the limit for direct current, this impedance is merely the residual resistance of the coil 20. Now at the same low frequencies, the condenser 24 provides very little shunt-ing of the resistor 23 s so that current feedback from the collector 3 directly to the emitter 2, independently of the transformer 2D, 2i, is promoted. This situation may result in instability or spurious oscillations at unwanted frequencies. These may be prevented by inclusion of a resistor 25 in series with the emitter.

Another resistor 26 is connected in series with the collector to prevent possible damage to the transistor through passage of excess collector' current from the source 5. To prevent it from absorbing substantial power at the desired fre quency of oscillation, it is by-passed by a condensery 21.

Figf4 also illustrates the use of a self-biasing arrangement, as described in United States Patent 2,517,960, which issued August 8, 1950, on an application of H. L. Barney and R. C. Mathes, Serial No. 22,854, filed April 23, 1948 in whicha resistor 23, shunted by a by-pass condenser 24, is connected between the base terminal 4 .of the transistor and the junction of the emitter and collector paths. In a typical transistor under normal conditions of bias, the direct component of collector current, flowing outwardl from the transistor, exceeds the inward owing direct current of the emitter, and as a result there is an inward-flowing current to the base terminal. If passed through a suitable resistor, this base current may be used to bias the base negatively, and thus to make the emitter positive with respect to the base. Accordingly the direct current source in the emitter path may be eliminated. The biasing resistor 23 is by-passed by the condenser 24 to prevent it from affecting variational components of the base current at the frequency of oscillation.

Fig. 5 shows still another circuit connguration embodying the principles of the invention, in which a series-resonant circuit L', r', C' is employed. The primary Winding 3D of a trans former 3 l having a turns ratio is connected between the direct-current source 5 and the collector 3. The secondary winding 32 is connected in series with a tuning inductance L having a resistance 1", a tuning least several times that of the emitter-to-base impedance. In this circuit, the same variational current ie flows through each of the series-connected elements listed above (neglecting the small current by-passed around the emitter through the resistor 33). Accordingly, the amounts of power allotted to the load, the seriesresonant elements, and the emitter are proportional to their respective resistive impedances, and these may be suitably proportioned in accordance with the general principles described in connection with Fig. 2. The transformer turns ratio is then so chosen that the collector impedance Z22 is matched to the impedance Z2 which it faces; namely, the impedance presented by the primary or" the transformer. Thus the total available power of the transistor is utilized, being distributed as required among tuning elements, the emitter, and load.

What is claimed is:

1. An oscillation generator which comprises a transistor having a .base electrode, an emitter electrode of relatively low impedance and a collector electrode of relatively high impedance, an external network interconnecting said electrodes, said network including a path extending from the collector electrode to the emitter electrode by way of which collector output power is fed back to the emitter, said network including also a reactive frequency-determining circuit, and a low impedance load connected between the emitter electrode and the base electrode.

2. Apparatus as defined in claim 1 wherein the frequency-determining circuit is an antiresonant circuit connected lbetween the collector and the base, said antiresonant circuit comprising a parallel combination of a coil and a condenser, said coil having a connection point intermediate its ends, and wherein the feedback path includes a conductor interconnecting said connection point with the emitter.

3. Apparatus as dened in claim 1 wherein the frequency-determining circuit is an antiresonant circuit, comprising a coil and two series-connected condensers in shunt with said coil, connected between the collector and the base, and wherein the feedback path includes a conductive connection extending from the common terminal of said condensers to the emitter.

fi.` Apparatus as defined in claim 1 wherein the frequency-determining circuit is an antiresonant circuit, comprising a primary coil and a condenser in shunt with said coil, connected in series between the collector and the base, and wherein the feedback path includes a secondary lcoil, inductively coupled to said primary coil, connect? ed in series between the emitter and the base.

5. Apparatus as defined in claim 1 wherein the feedback path comprises a primary winding interconnecting the collector with the base and a secondary windingy inductively coupled to said primary winding, interconnecting the emitter with the base, and wherein the frequency-determining circuit is a series-resonant circuit com prsing a coil and a condenser connected in series between said secondary coil and the base.

LARNED A. MEACHAM.

No references cited. 

